Home technology is always moving, always improving, always promising to provide ease and convenience to our lives. So what sort of innovations stand to make a big impact? We caught a glimpse of the very near future at the CEDIA (Custom Electronic Design & Installation Association) Expo held recently in Dallas.

The Motorrad Vision Next 100 concept does away with a traditional mechanical frame, replacing it with a flexible material that bends when the driver turns. It adjusts sensitivity based on speed; the effort required to turn increases as the bike goes faster, improving stability and safety at high speeds while adding an unprecedented sense of connection to the riding experience. The focus on connection, however, doesn’t stop there. An integrated “Digital Companion” suggests adjustments to improve performance, an augmented-reality visor tracks eye movement to provide constant real-time feedback, and self-balancing technology allows riders to remain in riding position, even at a complete stop.

James Hoevelmann of Sullivan, Missouri, used to work in hospital construction. But these days, even though he suffers from severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the retired carpenter, 74, doesn’t want to go anywhere near a medical facility. And he doesn’t need to, even though his COPD has been bad enough in the past to regularly land him in the emergency room and the intensive care unit. The reason: Hoevelmann now gets his care from Mercy Virtual Care Center some 50 miles away in Chesterfield.

Equipped with an iPad and devices such as a blood pressure monitor and scale that stream his vital signs and other data from his home to the Mercy Virtual “command center,” he and his providers have been able to detect subtle health shifts in time to avert the cascade of deterioration that put him in the ICU. “We can trend the data on a daily basis and intervene in many cases even before patients experience symptoms,” says Gavin Helton, Mercy’s medical director. Says Hoevelmann: “I feel safer knowing I have those people behind me.”

The credit card, dubbed Motion Code, contains a small display in the reverse of the card across the signature strip which randomly generates the card's new security code -- the card verification value (CVV) -- every hour, according to The Memo, which spoke to the company, Oberthur Technologies. This makes the card useless for any thief who has the card's number without the new CVV.

More than 100 years ago, the barn that now occupies a pristine piece of property in the Catskill Mountains functioned as all barns do, by housing livestock, feed, and farm implements.

But that was then, and this is now, and based on the level of technology recently incorporated into the relocated and refurbished building, you’d never guess that its roots date back to before Thomas Edison invented the light bulb.

The truly smart home may be some way off yet, but individual technologies can already do a lot. Here’s a closer look:

1 Adjust your lights

Smart lightbulbs like those made by Philips and Lifx allow users to adjust the lighting in their homes using voice control or an app. These lights can also access your phone’s GPS signal to detect when you’re on your way home and illuminate the interior as you walk in the door.

2 Restock the pantry

Amazon’s Dash buttons allow you to order items like snacks and paper towels simply by pushing a plastic button. Some gadgets take this a step further: Brita, for example, offers a water pitcher that knows when the filter is about to expire and automatically orders a fresh one online.

3 Spy on your fridge

Samsung’s wi-fi-equipped refrigerator has a camera inside (see vid below) so that you can see what items you’re out of when you’re at the grocer, for instance.

4 Change your climate

Nest’s thermostat learns about your temperature preferences over time and automatically adjusts according to factors like the time of day.

5 Watch your back

Companies like Icontrol Networks and Nest sell Internet-connected security cameras that can send alerts and record video when motion is detected in your home. Some gadgets, like the Nest Cam Outdoor, can also tell the difference between people and animals to avoid false alarms.

Rather than wait to check in, they'll wear a radio frequency badge to track their movements, allowing staffers to come to them as they wander to a sitting area or snack bar. During surgery, family members can check status boards to see when a procedure is underway and when the patient moves to a private recovery room. Often, patients meet with their surgeon via videoconferencing before discharge. "The whole place is focused on not being sick, but on getting better," says Brett Simon, an anesthesiologist and the center's director.

Josie Robertson is one of a slew of state-of-the-art ambulatory centers being opened by health systems to reduce costs and hospitalizations while also drumming up business. The aim is "a high-end patient experience," says Rudolph P. Valentini, chief medical officer at Children's Hospital of Michigan, of the striking new pediatric center in Troy that opened in February. These centers are all equipped to handle an emergency, and patients can quickly be moved to the inpatient hospital if necessary.

“Co-founded by Alex Garden, the former president of Zynga Studios, and Julia Collins, who comes from a restaurant background,Zume Pizza employs a mix of robots and humans to prepare and bake its pies.

“We have what we call a co-bot environment, so humans and robots working collaboratively,” says Collins. “Robots do everything from dispensing sauce, to spreading sauce, to placing pizzas in the oven.

Each pie is baked in the delivery van, which means “you get something that is pizzeria fresh, hot and sizzling,” says Garden. It’s an important detail; as cool — and cost-saving — as Zume’s robots are, taste matters most.”

This workhorse of commercial aviation accounts for one of every three commercial flights, and there are around 2,000 of them in the air at any given time.

Every one of those planes rolled out of Boeing’s Renton Production Facility, where workers build a 737 in just nine days. The factory, near Seattle, pump them out at the rate of 42 per month, and Boeing claims the 1.1-million-square-foot facility is most efficient airplane factory in the world.